SoftBank, Naver JV to tender minor stake in Line operator's $1 billion buyback

A joint venture of Japan's SoftBank Corp and South Korea's Naver will sell back about 2% of its 64.42% stake in LY Corp, which operates the popular messaging app Line, LY said in a share buyback disclosure on Friday.

The voting rights of LY owned by the SoftBank-Naver venture "A Holdings" will be down to 62.50% when LY's 150 billion yen ($1.01 billion) buyback program is completed, the company said.

The buyback is intended to increase the liquidity of its shares to the levels mandated by the Tokyo Stock Exchange for companies listed on its Prime Market and unrelated to the Line data leak issue, an LY spokesperson said.

Naver referred to LY's disclosure when asked for comment. SoftBank did not immediately respond to a request for comment.